it's a bad, bad ritual
by theviolonist
Summary: She used to go to church once. They never spoke of this kind of confession.


She watches his lips form the words 'I promise' and she knows. He has broken promises before. This doesn't mean anything.

She won't be free. She will never be free of him; of the way his eyes bore into her, of the movement of his hands, his fangs, his lips. Her vampire blood boils; she could make for him now, he would never suspect. She could have a shot at driving a stake through his heart, just once. For her fallen friends. Or she could run. She could still run.

She used to go to church once. She didn't like it. She was an impatient child, she found it boring, long, too verbose with its Latin, the priest's lips moving in the murky darkness. Sometimes she wishes she could go back, but she doesn't. Her confessor might suspect something; none of God's subjects look eternally young. That, and she's afraid.

She takes a step forward. The forest is breathing around her; she can hear the faint heartbeat of a rabbit, miles off. Klaus's eyes shift, from one side of her face to the other, her lips, her eyes again. A range of expressions come over his face: smugness, fear, surprise. Hope. Damn him. Damn him to Hell.

She used to go to church once. They never spoke of this kind of confession.

Another step. If she kissed him now, what would happen? Would God strike her down with holy fire? Would the earth collapse around her? Of course not. She's Caroline Forbes - she's a secondary character. The earth doesn't collapse for her. God doesn't care about her. If she kissed him right now, he would kiss her back. A minor angel would turn away from the sight. What was she thinking, falling in love with him?

(She'll say it was accidental. She'll say she tripped, and fell into his arms. He made her, despite her vervain-laced blood.)

She used to go to church once; now she doesn't, because she doesn't believe in God anymore. If there was one, he would stop this. He would stop her from leaning in; from parting her lips; from feeling his hot breath and his eyes, burning. But there isn't. So Caroline Forbes smiles, and she gives in.

* * *

There was nothing romantic about it. He tore her favorite blouse in two, so hard she _had_ to wrap her legs around his waist, to keep him close as she possibly could, hips rutting into her. His kisses were bruising and desperate. He pounded into her and sunk his teeth into her shoulder and she had lacerations on her back, from the tree bark. She ripped his necklace from his throat purely to be vindictive, and to keep him from reminding her of the first time they met. This is not a story. This is not a love story.

This is not _her_ love story.

She has one; she's had one since she was three, and this isn't it. Here is how the narrative goes: she meets a boy with black tousled hair and a motorcycle, and he falls in love with her. She's always thought she would figure the rest out later. Romantic comedies stop with the sunset; they don't show the happily ever after.

In the stories there are no vampires, no hybrids and no Originals and no psychotic exes with an unholy fixation on her best friend. That's okay. She's Caroline Forbes; she knows how to accommodate. Hell, it's practically her speciality, at this point. Accommodate, when Dad moved out and she was left to live with her surly police officer of a mom. Accommodate, when the biker with the tousled hair turned on his magic powers and threw her on a bed and she couldn't say no. Accommodate, when she died. Accommodate, when she woke up, and all she wanted for breakfast was blood.

Still. Just because Damon is a jerk doesn't mean she doesn't get her happily ever after. This isn't it. She's got the ever after part covered; there must be someone out there who wants to love her maddeningly, desperately, who isn't the same man she and her friends fought against for months. He killed so many people she gets sick just thinking about it. Being in love with him... that makes her even more of a monster than she already is.

So no. There was nothing romantic about it. His lips on her were petrol and she was a flame, and she burned in his arms and the whole memory is ashes, a photograph with holes burned into it. He licked between her thighs and she convulsed and screamed, she didn't bother to clamp a hand over her mouth. Who would hear, anyway? The rabbits?

* * *

(They did talk. He said something and she thought, he will leave. He will leave forever. I can answer one of his questions.

"Do you want to be human again?"

That's not what she expected.

Does she? His eyes ask. She never noticed, until then; they're almost exactly the same color as hers. She hates him for it, for a brief, incandescent second.

"No."

His lips are shiny. It's distracting, but if she leans in and kisses him again, it will be defeat. She keeps a tally in her head; she can't pretend he doesn't.

"Are you certain, love?"

She feels naked, but her blouse is ripped. She shivers.

"Why? Do you have a new magic trick, is that why you came back? To lord your handmade cure over us?"

"You know why I came back."

Not for her. For Katherine. That lie is easy to believe, if she concentrates.

"Why are you asking me, anyway? Why do you care? I thought you wanted me to be your... vampire queen, or whatever."

His lips thin; then he smiles. "I'm afraid it's a little bit more complicated than that."

This time she can't help a smirk. "Oh? Did everyone not bow as soon as you appeared back in New Orleans? Color me surprised."

He laughs out loud. It's surprisingly pleasant. Something low in her stomach throbs. He killed thousands, she reminds herself.

He traces his fingers over her naked arm. She could shrink away.

"Humans make plans," he whispers, not looking at her. "Humans are the ones who go to university and have... frat parties, or whatever you call them. But we are vampires. We have eternity, Caroline." Her name in his mouth makes her vibrate like a piano string. "There is more than this. There is the world, at our command... at our mercy. You can do anything. Not just this. Not just humanity. You can live that life if you want, you can live a hundred times over."

"And?" It's not her. It's just the words she can see on his lips like silt, words he doesn't say. She wants to hear. She's never been good with curiosity, cat or not. Besides, he's right - she's immortal.

Then he raises his eyes to her. This is what she could never bear about him: the way he loves her so, so hard, so much. It's not romantic. It's messed-up, is what it is. He shouldn't love her. Monsters aren't allowed to love. What would the world be like if they were?

"You can do everything, Caroline. I've told you before, and I -" he reins something in, frustrated. "When I said I would wait for you, I didn't mean a year. I meant forever. There are countries to be visited, lives to be lived, people to be drunk from, kingdoms to be erected. You can be everything, from now on. Just because they," he gestures disdainfully at the Salvatore house in the distance, "made you believe you have to go on as you did, doesn't mean it's true. You are a vampire, Caroline Forbes."

There is tenderness, in his face; there is fury, and there is lust. She can't make sense of all of it. He presses a last kiss to her lips, searing, clogging. He kisses her for so long that she stops breathing. But she doesn't need to breathe - neither of them do.

"The world is a small playground when you're immortal," he says in her ear, and she can feel his grin, "I'm sure we'll meet again."

The next time she looks around her, he's gone.)

* * *

She doesn't tell Elena. She doesn't tell anyone. It's shame, it's probably what it is. Or it's that conversation. Or it's the fact that when her fingers drift down her stomach at night, it's invariably his face that comes up, his mouth stretched in a smile, lips open to bite.

She thinks about New Orleans. She never went there, but it's not that far. Not that she will go. She heard the stories: it's dangerous. But she's not a little girl anymore. Now she's the thing that's dangerous, she's the thing with teeth, she's the animal. Maybe there was some truth to what he said. Maybe she should consider the consequences of that.

She fucks a TA and doesn't call. Elena doesn't pay attention; she seems somewhere else, overjoyed with the fact she's alive. You wouldn't think she'd just gone through a break-up. She becomes easy to hide secrets from. Truth is, when she was little Caroline used to envy her, for her football player boyfriend and her good looks and that gentleness she doesn't even fake. But she's been eating the scraps of Elena's meals for years now; maybe it's time to change tactics.

She looks at people in the halls differently. They don't know hunger. They don't know strength. They don't know speed, and they don't know she can hear their conversations from miles away, all their petty concerns and failed tests, all their shopping tips. They don't know what it's like to break a bone because you've been slammed into a tree so hard and feel it grow back beneath your skin.

They don't know hunger. But she does.

* * *

There was something else. It was the way he smiled, just before she kissed him again for the second time. Like he couldn't believe it. Like he was lucky. She has hated that smile for weeks now, because of the wonder it arises in her. He killed twelve hybrids in one fell swoop. He was up to his elbows in blood. But it was so long ago; at the thought of it now, she feels nothing but hunger. And yes, she feels wretched. She does.

"Do you sometimes... forget about the people who died?" she asks Elena once, as she's doing her nails, one foot propped on the wooden desk.

Elena stops blowing on her toes for a second to answer, "Of course." She continues almost immediately, "I mean, we have to. Otherwise we'd just spend our time mourning, you know? They'd want us to go on living." She nods, satisfied with her answer. "Yeah. They'd want us to be happy." And she goes back to blowing.

Caroline won't say she wasn't tempted the first time, when he said he'd take her everywhere, make her discover the world. She's never been out of the state. For a second she felt elated, her heart grown two sizes, not affection but the pumping muscle, the hard chant of blood. I can be it, she thought then, even as she shot him down with sharp words. And then, when he said, 'your last.' Who thinks about that? She's nineteen. Well. No. She's not really nineteen.

It's not a week after, in English History, when she opens her book and the first thing that jumps to her eyes is his face. He's in the background of the painting, his hands covered with lace, his head down. He's smiling. It's the same smile he directed at her, three weeks ago, just before he entered her. It drove her mad then. She wanted to tear it off his face, or kiss him until he could never smile again.

But it is him. After a little scrutiny she also spots Elijah, and Kol in a corner; Rebekah is suspiciously absent, probably wreaking havoc in... she glances at the blurb next to the picture - sixteenth century France.

That's when the realization hits her. He will never die. She will never die. He will break his promise, and she will forgive him. Eventually. She will forgive him. There is no other choice. There are a thousand futures open in front of her, but she will forgive him in one of them. The certainty pulses in her chest like a second heart.

Her throat is tight; her hand goes up, to ask if she can leave. But she puts it down almost immediately. She can compel the teacher later; she can re-take the class if she fails it, now or in fifty years, or never. Her head is full of white noise. She picks up her bag and leaves without even looking around her, the auditorium door slamming loudly at her back. Can he feel her, from all the way up there? Can he feel her giving in? Is he pressing his ear to a wall, breathing hard?

Probably not. He's a bastard. He killed thousands of people. He loves her. None of it makes sense. She can hear it in his voice in her head, mocking and tender. _None of it makes sense, love._

* * *

The drive to the airport is a short one, and Caroline is so jittery she feels like her bones might break. If they do, she will grow new ones. She's not sure she will do it - in fact, she probably won't - but it doesn't matter. If not today, then tomorrow. Or a thousand years from now. It doesn't make much difference. One of them, the Originals, she can't remember which, told her that once. _After a while, it sort of all blurs together._ Maybe this will happen to her. Maybe one day she won't remember what his hands felt like when he touched her, and she will have to go back, to find out. Or maybe - maybe one day she will forget what she hated him so much for.

She takes a breath as she walks towards the counter. A stewardess with a cap gestures to her that it's her turn. There, Caroline thinks. You win.

Unless, a voice says inside her head, unless you're the one who's winning.


End file.
